In preparing for the men's Bible study this evening, I've been reminded what an amazing letter Galatians is. Angry, passionate and containing the most incredible charter for freedom ever penned.
I've been particularly struck by 5:16-26. If his first hearers were not to submit to the Law, what was to stop them living morally chaotic lives? The Spirit. Simple as that.
God's Spirit is the powerful presence of the future (as well as God himself) in our present. He ensures we triumph in the battle between the present evil age and the glorious age to come (Galatians is a wonderfully apocalyptic book!).
5:17 is not saying that we flail helplessly, pulled first one way by our flesh and then another by the Spirit. Rather, it's reminding us that because we are indwelt by the Spirit, we cannot choose as our way of life, behaviour that is opposed to God's will. Rather we can only do - that is, we are only allowed to choose to do - what God wants. More than that, though, the Spirit in us is God's investment in us not only choosing that b ut also being able to live it because he is the Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead.
Amazing stuff.
And there's more. We don't do this alone. The fruit of the Spirit is not about more loving, joyful and peaceful human beings but about more loving, joyful and peaceful human communities. Churches ought to be places marked by acceptance and love, peace between us, joy in one another's company, faithfulness in relationships, self control in the way we speak to and about one another. They ought to be that. But...
But, they can be that because that's the kind of community the Holy Spirit grows when a group of Christians tell God that's what they want and commit themselves to walking the way of the Spirit.
Monday, November 28, 2005
Friday, November 25, 2005
Keeping the faith
It's advent this Sunday, so new things in the morning, but in the evening we're finishing our series in 1 John.
I do wonder whether anyone in the church knows we're in such a series! We started back in late September and interspersed reading 1 John with prayer and cafe church. Running a series is good for the preacher and those involved in leading services. It also seems to have helped those leading our homegroups. But I'm beginning to question whether those attending find it that helpful. After all, if you miss a couple of evenings in a series that doesn't run every week, it's not long before you lose any sense of continuity. Ah well...
Anyway, this week we're thinking about keeping the faith. John stresses the need to hear the testimony of God about the truth of what we believe, follow the example of Jesus who in his fleshly life (so emphasised by John) kept true to his mission and rely on the power of the Holy Spirit to give us the resources to live as God wants us to. It's great Trinitarian stuff!
But we often tend to read it as speaking to me as an individual; how I keep the faith in my isolated walk in the world, out there among colleagues who don't see things the way I do.
John, however, talks about an eternal triangle, involving God, me and my brothers and sisters. He writes not to individuals but to individuals in community. He does not suppose that we'll keep the faith on our own. He assumes that we do this together, that we'll support and encourage one another.
But I wonder if there's also more to it than this. John was writing to communities - possibly in ancient Ephesus - where life was more settled and local. People worked where they lived. The people they lived and ate with were the people they worked alongside in whatever trade the household followed. Very few lived in one place and worked in another. very few lived with one group of people and worked with a different group. So for them, the opportunities to help one another live out their Christian faith were more frequent and came in every strata of the daily routine.
Our lives are not like this. so how do we meaningfully support and encourage those brothers and sisters we only see once a week at church - assuming we all attend every week - or once a fortnight at home group - assuming we get to each one of those. We can go several days or even weeks between encounters.
Can we do it virtually? Can we find a way of using texts and emails as a substitute for being face-to-face? Many recoil at such a notion, arguing that you've got to be with someone to support them. But is this really true? Many churches have for years run a telephone prayer network, where requests are phoned around a group of people who pray for specific situations they've received alerts about. Sometimes members of the network pray with each other on the phone.
Is doing the same thing by text or email or through MSN messenger really that different? It's just a thought. We'll see how people react to it on Sunday!
Going to see Elbow at Brixton Academy tonight. Can't wait!
I do wonder whether anyone in the church knows we're in such a series! We started back in late September and interspersed reading 1 John with prayer and cafe church. Running a series is good for the preacher and those involved in leading services. It also seems to have helped those leading our homegroups. But I'm beginning to question whether those attending find it that helpful. After all, if you miss a couple of evenings in a series that doesn't run every week, it's not long before you lose any sense of continuity. Ah well...
Anyway, this week we're thinking about keeping the faith. John stresses the need to hear the testimony of God about the truth of what we believe, follow the example of Jesus who in his fleshly life (so emphasised by John) kept true to his mission and rely on the power of the Holy Spirit to give us the resources to live as God wants us to. It's great Trinitarian stuff!
But we often tend to read it as speaking to me as an individual; how I keep the faith in my isolated walk in the world, out there among colleagues who don't see things the way I do.
John, however, talks about an eternal triangle, involving God, me and my brothers and sisters. He writes not to individuals but to individuals in community. He does not suppose that we'll keep the faith on our own. He assumes that we do this together, that we'll support and encourage one another.
But I wonder if there's also more to it than this. John was writing to communities - possibly in ancient Ephesus - where life was more settled and local. People worked where they lived. The people they lived and ate with were the people they worked alongside in whatever trade the household followed. Very few lived in one place and worked in another. very few lived with one group of people and worked with a different group. So for them, the opportunities to help one another live out their Christian faith were more frequent and came in every strata of the daily routine.
Our lives are not like this. so how do we meaningfully support and encourage those brothers and sisters we only see once a week at church - assuming we all attend every week - or once a fortnight at home group - assuming we get to each one of those. We can go several days or even weeks between encounters.
Can we do it virtually? Can we find a way of using texts and emails as a substitute for being face-to-face? Many recoil at such a notion, arguing that you've got to be with someone to support them. But is this really true? Many churches have for years run a telephone prayer network, where requests are phoned around a group of people who pray for specific situations they've received alerts about. Sometimes members of the network pray with each other on the phone.
Is doing the same thing by text or email or through MSN messenger really that different? It's just a thought. We'll see how people react to it on Sunday!
Going to see Elbow at Brixton Academy tonight. Can't wait!
Still no latte, but...
Last Sunday we had another cafe-style service - our seventh - celebrating our 142nd birthday.
We built a cairn of stones at the front of the church representing all the memories and stories held by people in the church - some of whom had first come in the 1930s. We played pass the parcel, we thought about the nurture of the rising generation and we had a liturgy of passing on the baton from the older to the younger people in the church.
It all worked well.
Cafe church is becoming a fixture of life here. Most people accept it as part of the monthly programme. We're also getting quite a few visitors to each one.
So the plan is to continue them into the New Year. I'm hoping they'll continue to evolve into events that combine conversation and liturgy, ritual and fellowship.
We built a cairn of stones at the front of the church representing all the memories and stories held by people in the church - some of whom had first come in the 1930s. We played pass the parcel, we thought about the nurture of the rising generation and we had a liturgy of passing on the baton from the older to the younger people in the church.
It all worked well.
Cafe church is becoming a fixture of life here. Most people accept it as part of the monthly programme. We're also getting quite a few visitors to each one.
So the plan is to continue them into the New Year. I'm hoping they'll continue to evolve into events that combine conversation and liturgy, ritual and fellowship.
Monday, November 21, 2005
Service and services
Kez, commenting on the last posting, is right to suggest that we need to get out more. We've had a bit of discussion about this already on this blog.
But even getting out more doesn't alter the fact that we've got to think about what kind of service we offer those who come seeking us out. Alan's point is that there are still significant numbers of people who want the church. Indeed he argues that some are called to be church members to keep the church going for the benefit of its non-members. This is a distinctive (and possibly eccentric) spin on Archbishop Temple's idea that the church is the only club that exists for the benefit of its non-members.
I guess my bottom line is that I want people to meet and engage with Jesus. They might do this as they access a service we offer - whether that's a regular Sunday gathering or something special we do because they ask us (a dedication, wedding or funeral). But maybe they are more likely to do this if we go out looking for ways to make contact with them - in the pubs and clubs of our communities, at the school gate, at work, etc - as Kez suggests.
I say this because I don't think I buy Alan's idea that people are 'cultural Christians'. I'm not sure what he means by this beyond the fact that they hold residual Christian values (precious and in need of re-inforcing any way we can). I'm not sure what this has to do with knowing Jesus in a living and vibrant way that changes our values and lifestyles.
But I'm happy if 'cultural Christians' come to my church seeking a dedication (our alternative to baptising babies), a wedding or a funeral. It is a pastoral opportunity that enables me to talk about the Christian story and how it impacts on their lives. More than that, it's an opportunity for Jesus to touch their lives in unexpected ways. I'm all for it.
But even getting out more doesn't alter the fact that we've got to think about what kind of service we offer those who come seeking us out. Alan's point is that there are still significant numbers of people who want the church. Indeed he argues that some are called to be church members to keep the church going for the benefit of its non-members. This is a distinctive (and possibly eccentric) spin on Archbishop Temple's idea that the church is the only club that exists for the benefit of its non-members.
I guess my bottom line is that I want people to meet and engage with Jesus. They might do this as they access a service we offer - whether that's a regular Sunday gathering or something special we do because they ask us (a dedication, wedding or funeral). But maybe they are more likely to do this if we go out looking for ways to make contact with them - in the pubs and clubs of our communities, at the school gate, at work, etc - as Kez suggests.
I say this because I don't think I buy Alan's idea that people are 'cultural Christians'. I'm not sure what he means by this beyond the fact that they hold residual Christian values (precious and in need of re-inforcing any way we can). I'm not sure what this has to do with knowing Jesus in a living and vibrant way that changes our values and lifestyles.
But I'm happy if 'cultural Christians' come to my church seeking a dedication (our alternative to baptising babies), a wedding or a funeral. It is a pastoral opportunity that enables me to talk about the Christian story and how it impacts on their lives. More than that, it's an opportunity for Jesus to touch their lives in unexpected ways. I'm all for it.
Saturday, November 19, 2005
Basic models
I've been reading an intriguing book by Alan Billings. It could well be standard middle-of-the-road Anglicanism for all I know - but since I'm not one of those...
Alan is the reason I'm a Christian. He prepared me for confirmation in the early 70s before I defected to the free church across the road (better girls!) But the indelible mark he left on me was that Christianity was absolutely about the world we live in. God is interested in the world and not just the souls of people.
His book looks at why people in a secular culture come to church to have their babies baptised, get married and bury their dead. He argues that it's because people are 'cultural Christians' and when faced with these key moments in their lives want to face them in some way in the presence of God.
It's an intriguing and sometimes compelling argument. I do find myself in sharp disagreement over his definition of Christian and hence wondering whether his label 'cultural Christian' really has any validity. But it's made me think - and not many book do that.
What I am really wrestling with at the moment is his discussion of different churchmanship - the parish versus gathered model. This is ecclesiology 101 but it came as a forceful reminder to me as I read it this morning that this one reason why we - a gathered church - struggle with being inclusive.
The argument is that the parish model enables the church to include everyone in a defined area and in some way offer to serve them. The gathered model says that church is for the people who have chosen to be part of it and our only engagement with the wider neighbourhood is for evangelism.
I want to be a gathered church doing parish-style ministry. But is that possible? Do the 'cultural Christians' who live around me - if that's what they - see my church as a valid expression of the Christianity they think they want when they are hatching, matching or dispatching? Or is the default position of English people to seek these services from the church of England - of which we have plenty.
I am just embarking on marriage prep with a couple who are not church attenders at the moment, though she used to come to our church when she was younger. They want to get married in church for precisely the reasons Alan suggests in his book - 'it's not really proper getting married anywhere else.' 'I want God to be part of the ceremony'.
But I suspect that most people like this couple would seek out the parish church rather than my Baptist church.
The question I'd like to work with for a while is this: can we identify an area - not well served by other churches - and offer to be a 'parish' church to its residents? What would we have to do that was different? What services would we have to provide?
More fundamentally, how could we let people know that we were operating in this inclusive, parish way and were not just a congregation for those opting to join and prepared to get over the hurdles to associate with us?
Ah, questions, questions. What fun!
Alan is the reason I'm a Christian. He prepared me for confirmation in the early 70s before I defected to the free church across the road (better girls!) But the indelible mark he left on me was that Christianity was absolutely about the world we live in. God is interested in the world and not just the souls of people.
His book looks at why people in a secular culture come to church to have their babies baptised, get married and bury their dead. He argues that it's because people are 'cultural Christians' and when faced with these key moments in their lives want to face them in some way in the presence of God.
It's an intriguing and sometimes compelling argument. I do find myself in sharp disagreement over his definition of Christian and hence wondering whether his label 'cultural Christian' really has any validity. But it's made me think - and not many book do that.
What I am really wrestling with at the moment is his discussion of different churchmanship - the parish versus gathered model. This is ecclesiology 101 but it came as a forceful reminder to me as I read it this morning that this one reason why we - a gathered church - struggle with being inclusive.
The argument is that the parish model enables the church to include everyone in a defined area and in some way offer to serve them. The gathered model says that church is for the people who have chosen to be part of it and our only engagement with the wider neighbourhood is for evangelism.
I want to be a gathered church doing parish-style ministry. But is that possible? Do the 'cultural Christians' who live around me - if that's what they - see my church as a valid expression of the Christianity they think they want when they are hatching, matching or dispatching? Or is the default position of English people to seek these services from the church of England - of which we have plenty.
I am just embarking on marriage prep with a couple who are not church attenders at the moment, though she used to come to our church when she was younger. They want to get married in church for precisely the reasons Alan suggests in his book - 'it's not really proper getting married anywhere else.' 'I want God to be part of the ceremony'.
But I suspect that most people like this couple would seek out the parish church rather than my Baptist church.
The question I'd like to work with for a while is this: can we identify an area - not well served by other churches - and offer to be a 'parish' church to its residents? What would we have to do that was different? What services would we have to provide?
More fundamentally, how could we let people know that we were operating in this inclusive, parish way and were not just a congregation for those opting to join and prepared to get over the hurdles to associate with us?
Ah, questions, questions. What fun!
Wednesday, November 16, 2005
Spam and blogs
Time was when spam was just a rather unpleasant processed meat product. Now it's also an irritating intrusion into the blogosphere.
I have decided to activate the word verification software which ought to prevent automated comments from being left - so I won't have to go through deleting ads for second-hand cars or various money-making schemes.
It only adds a simple step for you if you want to leave a comment - so please don't be put off!
I have decided to activate the word verification software which ought to prevent automated comments from being left - so I won't have to go through deleting ads for second-hand cars or various money-making schemes.
It only adds a simple step for you if you want to leave a comment - so please don't be put off!
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
Emerging from what?
Much chat about the so-called emerging church seems to assume that it comes from nowhere in the sense that it consists of groups forming in homes or pubs with no connection to any other Christian community. This is because many emerging church groups are set up by those who have left what stuart Murray calls inherited church because they cannot function within it.
I have for some time thought, however, that new forms of church will also need to emerge from traditional/inherited churches or those churches will not see the decade out.
I'm sorting out a cafe-style gathering for our evening anniversary service this weekend which is an exercise in looking back - sharing memories, telling stories - and looking forward - what memories will the rising generation be forming in the coming years?
It's got me thinking about whether the church of the future really can emerge out of the church of the present and the past. Is it possible for the rising generation to begin to create a church in its image as the generation currently dominant in the church has created a community in its image over the past 30 years or so?
More specifically, I want to help us explore what those currently running the church need to be doing to prepare the next generation to take the church on. The dilemma is that we so train and nurture people that they will only be able to perpetuate the current structures. How can we nurture our young people and young adults in the ethos and values of Christian community in such a way that they are able to give their own shape to those values in the churches they create?
Even more importantly, how can we give space to the rising generation to begin creating church that meets their needs while still functioning within the framework of community that meets the needs of the current leading generations?
One obvious response to this is to allow the creation of lean-to groups - gatherings of people who want to explore different ways of doing things - which are resourced by the church they lean against. Those involved in such groups would be members of the supporting church. In a sense this is an adaptation of the church planting model so popular in the 1970s and 80s but it might create space for experiment and adaptation, for the exploration of what shapes work for church in very specific contemporary social contexts.
It will be interesting, as we do a ritual handing on of the baton from the over-40s to the under 40s on Sunday evening, to see what emerges from it. Will it just be a nice thing to do or will actually shift the balance of power within our community with the current generation genuinely making room for the emerging generation to explore, spread their wings and create new ways of doing things? We'll see.
I have for some time thought, however, that new forms of church will also need to emerge from traditional/inherited churches or those churches will not see the decade out.
I'm sorting out a cafe-style gathering for our evening anniversary service this weekend which is an exercise in looking back - sharing memories, telling stories - and looking forward - what memories will the rising generation be forming in the coming years?
It's got me thinking about whether the church of the future really can emerge out of the church of the present and the past. Is it possible for the rising generation to begin to create a church in its image as the generation currently dominant in the church has created a community in its image over the past 30 years or so?
More specifically, I want to help us explore what those currently running the church need to be doing to prepare the next generation to take the church on. The dilemma is that we so train and nurture people that they will only be able to perpetuate the current structures. How can we nurture our young people and young adults in the ethos and values of Christian community in such a way that they are able to give their own shape to those values in the churches they create?
Even more importantly, how can we give space to the rising generation to begin creating church that meets their needs while still functioning within the framework of community that meets the needs of the current leading generations?
One obvious response to this is to allow the creation of lean-to groups - gatherings of people who want to explore different ways of doing things - which are resourced by the church they lean against. Those involved in such groups would be members of the supporting church. In a sense this is an adaptation of the church planting model so popular in the 1970s and 80s but it might create space for experiment and adaptation, for the exploration of what shapes work for church in very specific contemporary social contexts.
It will be interesting, as we do a ritual handing on of the baton from the over-40s to the under 40s on Sunday evening, to see what emerges from it. Will it just be a nice thing to do or will actually shift the balance of power within our community with the current generation genuinely making room for the emerging generation to explore, spread their wings and create new ways of doing things? We'll see.
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
Isn't life busy
It's been really hectic since getting back from Prague and Budapest - I suppose that's the price you pay for having a holiday!
Listening to the wonderful Kate Bush album - you either love or hate her, I guess. I've loved her since Wuthering Heights and bar the rather disappointing Red Shoes, she's not made a bad album in almost 30 years.
I'm also reading Alan Billing's Secular Lives, sacred Hearts. Alan is the guy who first interested me in the Christian faith 35 years ago. A middle of the road Anglican whose brand of the faith I rejected in my early days as a Christian in favour of a more certain evangelicalism, I now find considerable wisdom in his reflections on the role of the church in a time of no religion.
Life's busy-ness has been exacerbated by having to edit and sign off the Autumn edition of Talk, the Magazine of Mainstream, the Word and Spirit network within the Baptist Union of Great Britain. It's a good issue but I wish we had the budget to make it look more interesting. Particularly worth checking out is Peter Oakes' article on The New Testament, The Roman Empire and Shopping. It's great stuff.
So, now we're into planning the next session's teaching programme, lining up the home group sessions and wondering why lots of this stuff increasingly fails to capture the imagination of the ordinary Christian.
Is it just me, or is it getting harder to create a programme in church that appeals to a broad cross section of our Christian public? I am about to embark on discussions with my leaders about launching a lean-to programme of home and church based alternatives to our normal church programme.
If anyone has such a 'shadow structure' operating in their churches and would like to share their wisdom with me, I'm all ears.
Listening to the wonderful Kate Bush album - you either love or hate her, I guess. I've loved her since Wuthering Heights and bar the rather disappointing Red Shoes, she's not made a bad album in almost 30 years.
I'm also reading Alan Billing's Secular Lives, sacred Hearts. Alan is the guy who first interested me in the Christian faith 35 years ago. A middle of the road Anglican whose brand of the faith I rejected in my early days as a Christian in favour of a more certain evangelicalism, I now find considerable wisdom in his reflections on the role of the church in a time of no religion.
Life's busy-ness has been exacerbated by having to edit and sign off the Autumn edition of Talk, the Magazine of Mainstream, the Word and Spirit network within the Baptist Union of Great Britain. It's a good issue but I wish we had the budget to make it look more interesting. Particularly worth checking out is Peter Oakes' article on The New Testament, The Roman Empire and Shopping. It's great stuff.
So, now we're into planning the next session's teaching programme, lining up the home group sessions and wondering why lots of this stuff increasingly fails to capture the imagination of the ordinary Christian.
Is it just me, or is it getting harder to create a programme in church that appeals to a broad cross section of our Christian public? I am about to embark on discussions with my leaders about launching a lean-to programme of home and church based alternatives to our normal church programme.
If anyone has such a 'shadow structure' operating in their churches and would like to share their wisdom with me, I'm all ears.
Monday, October 31, 2005
Travels
Just back from a week in Central Europe - Prague, Budapest and Vienna.
Prague is wonderful. It was very moving for a child of the sixties to stand in the old town square under the statue of Jan Hus and remember the days in 1968 when the Soviet tanks rolled in and the time 20+ years when Czechs thronged the square celebrating their freedom from communism.
It's particularly moving because Hus was a Christian reformer who campaigned for freedom for Christians to develop an expression of their faith for themselves rather than having to follow the one laid down in far away Rome. In particular, he wanted ordinary believers to have communion in both kinds regularly, that is to have both bread and wine whenever they attended. It's hard for us protestants who value celebrating the Lord's supper the way we do that for centuries people were barred from the table except at Easter when they got bread dipped in wine from the priest.
For many years I had a lapel pin of a chalice in my lapel that was given to me by a Czech believer I met in the 1970s - when it was tough for believers. It symbolised for me the freedom that we have in Christ and the freedom we campaign for believers to celebrate their faith in the way their conscience suggests they should.
Lots of other lovely things happened that I'll refer to in subsequent blogs...
Good to be back
Prague is wonderful. It was very moving for a child of the sixties to stand in the old town square under the statue of Jan Hus and remember the days in 1968 when the Soviet tanks rolled in and the time 20+ years when Czechs thronged the square celebrating their freedom from communism.
It's particularly moving because Hus was a Christian reformer who campaigned for freedom for Christians to develop an expression of their faith for themselves rather than having to follow the one laid down in far away Rome. In particular, he wanted ordinary believers to have communion in both kinds regularly, that is to have both bread and wine whenever they attended. It's hard for us protestants who value celebrating the Lord's supper the way we do that for centuries people were barred from the table except at Easter when they got bread dipped in wine from the priest.
For many years I had a lapel pin of a chalice in my lapel that was given to me by a Czech believer I met in the 1970s - when it was tough for believers. It symbolised for me the freedom that we have in Christ and the freedom we campaign for believers to celebrate their faith in the way their conscience suggests they should.
Lots of other lovely things happened that I'll refer to in subsequent blogs...
Good to be back
Thursday, October 20, 2005
Faith and young people
It's been furiously busy over the past week or so. Lots of things happening at church and a funeral for a troubled family. It's always the problem of church life, isn't it, that we plan and strategise and events conspire to delay or derail those plans.
We're off to Prague and Budapest at the weekend for a break - beer, jazz and conversation, history and architecture (what more could one want!) - but not before I've done a session with schools workers.
Preparing for this I've been re-reading David Voas and Bob Mayo and have got my hands on a paper by Nick Lear which is full of good stuff. I want to reflect on what difference the fact that young people know next to nothing about the Christian faith makes to our approach to Christian youthwork and schools ministry. Does this ignorance suggest indifference or hostility or potential interest?
I've blogged before on what Mayo thinks - that it's an opportunity if we're clever and creative. I think the jury might still be out. One of the issues is whether 'faith' is an option that's of any interest at all to young people. If Mayo's right that most teenagers live in a happy midi-narrative that the world as they experience is generally benign, what place would faith have in that?
What I'll be interested to hear from schools workers is whether there are social differences at work here. I would have thought that suburban kids generally inhabit a happy midi-narrative derived from reasonable income and supportive family life, combined with attending good schools and achieving reasonably well both academically and in sport. But kids in urban areas who are poorer, perhaps discriminated against because of race, facing family pressures at home and not seeing school as a place of opportunity might inhabit a midi-narrative that is not so happy.
This observation is either obvious or a cliche, I guess - and I know the pressures on suburban kids can be quite intense.
But Mayo's research raises the question about what the gospel is for these young people and how they might access it. People with no perceived needs, generally don't respond to the gospel of meeting needs - whether those needs are practical and social or emotional and 'spiritual'. If people don't feel in need, do they respond to a saviour who meets their needs? Isn't the proposition just simple gibberish?
I'll let you know how the group I'm talking to responds to this. If you have views, let me know.
We're off to Prague and Budapest at the weekend for a break - beer, jazz and conversation, history and architecture (what more could one want!) - but not before I've done a session with schools workers.
Preparing for this I've been re-reading David Voas and Bob Mayo and have got my hands on a paper by Nick Lear which is full of good stuff. I want to reflect on what difference the fact that young people know next to nothing about the Christian faith makes to our approach to Christian youthwork and schools ministry. Does this ignorance suggest indifference or hostility or potential interest?
I've blogged before on what Mayo thinks - that it's an opportunity if we're clever and creative. I think the jury might still be out. One of the issues is whether 'faith' is an option that's of any interest at all to young people. If Mayo's right that most teenagers live in a happy midi-narrative that the world as they experience is generally benign, what place would faith have in that?
What I'll be interested to hear from schools workers is whether there are social differences at work here. I would have thought that suburban kids generally inhabit a happy midi-narrative derived from reasonable income and supportive family life, combined with attending good schools and achieving reasonably well both academically and in sport. But kids in urban areas who are poorer, perhaps discriminated against because of race, facing family pressures at home and not seeing school as a place of opportunity might inhabit a midi-narrative that is not so happy.
This observation is either obvious or a cliche, I guess - and I know the pressures on suburban kids can be quite intense.
But Mayo's research raises the question about what the gospel is for these young people and how they might access it. People with no perceived needs, generally don't respond to the gospel of meeting needs - whether those needs are practical and social or emotional and 'spiritual'. If people don't feel in need, do they respond to a saviour who meets their needs? Isn't the proposition just simple gibberish?
I'll let you know how the group I'm talking to responds to this. If you have views, let me know.
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
The journey is all
Paul Lavender again makes a helpful point, one that Dan Kimball makes in his book Vintage Christianity, which is that people see their spiritual lives as a journey not a destination, that they are in perpetual motion, with nothing fixed and settled. To a great extent they are not looking for answers, rather their spiritual lives are nourished by questions, by exploring, by seeking fresh ideas and experiences.
For some Christians this is a difficult notion because we have been discipled into the view that we have 'the answer', that 'the answer' is everything that matters and that people need to hear 'the answer' - regardless of what question they're asking.
Of course, it should be pointed out, that such a view of spirituality applies to a minority of people. The Kendall research - published as Paul Heelas and Linda Woodhead The Spiritual Revolution - suggests that while many people in Kendall are attracted to alternative spiritualies, they still constitute an underwhelming minority of the general population - about the same or slightly less than the number attending church.
Bob Mayo - whose research I've alluded to before - would go further, especially in relation to young people, and say that they are not on a spiritual quest of any kind. They are happy in their 'midi-narrative' that life owes them material comforts and a good time, but issues of spirituality are matters of indifference to them. They go clubbing because they like music not because they are looking for a transcendental experience of some kind which the boomers and Gen Xers before them might have been (if Tom Beaudoin in Virtual Faith is to be believed).
All this, it seems to me, points up the strength of a going and waiting strategy suggested in the last blog. What kind of journey are our neighbours actually on? We might assume they go to the gym and yoga because they are seeking contact with some higher power. But they might go because their mates do it, they want to shed a few pounds or they fancy the yoga teacher. We might assume they visit old church buildings only because they have penchant for medieval architecture when in fact they yearn for contact with the mysterious and the divine.
All this suggests we need to listen rather than guess, go where they are, hang around and wait to hear what makes them tick. In this process we'll make new friends - a hugely valuable thing in its own right - and we'll hear what makes our new friends tick. Only then should we be praying for the insight into how we introduce our new friends to our old friend, Jesus.
For some Christians this is a difficult notion because we have been discipled into the view that we have 'the answer', that 'the answer' is everything that matters and that people need to hear 'the answer' - regardless of what question they're asking.
Of course, it should be pointed out, that such a view of spirituality applies to a minority of people. The Kendall research - published as Paul Heelas and Linda Woodhead The Spiritual Revolution - suggests that while many people in Kendall are attracted to alternative spiritualies, they still constitute an underwhelming minority of the general population - about the same or slightly less than the number attending church.
Bob Mayo - whose research I've alluded to before - would go further, especially in relation to young people, and say that they are not on a spiritual quest of any kind. They are happy in their 'midi-narrative' that life owes them material comforts and a good time, but issues of spirituality are matters of indifference to them. They go clubbing because they like music not because they are looking for a transcendental experience of some kind which the boomers and Gen Xers before them might have been (if Tom Beaudoin in Virtual Faith is to be believed).
All this, it seems to me, points up the strength of a going and waiting strategy suggested in the last blog. What kind of journey are our neighbours actually on? We might assume they go to the gym and yoga because they are seeking contact with some higher power. But they might go because their mates do it, they want to shed a few pounds or they fancy the yoga teacher. We might assume they visit old church buildings only because they have penchant for medieval architecture when in fact they yearn for contact with the mysterious and the divine.
All this suggests we need to listen rather than guess, go where they are, hang around and wait to hear what makes them tick. In this process we'll make new friends - a hugely valuable thing in its own right - and we'll hear what makes our new friends tick. Only then should we be praying for the insight into how we introduce our new friends to our old friend, Jesus.
Monday, October 10, 2005
Going and waiting
Paul Lavender has rightly spotted a flaw in my party strategy which is simply that it's an alternative one-size-fits-all mission strategy. I don't intend it to be.
He rightly points out that where he lives - in the North of England - parties are a bit middle class. People are more likely to congregate at the pub or Starbucks (surprisingly not seen as middle class - his phrase).
I guess this points out an obvious but essential thing: mission strategies need to fit the locality they're being tried in. If people don't go to parties, don't throw them. Find something people will come to. The point remains that we're doing this because we want to meet and hear them talking.
John Drane in an excellent article called 'Patterns of Evangelization in Paul and Jesus' (in Joel B Green and Max Turner [eds] Jesus of Nazareth: Lord and Christ, Eerdmanns 1994) suggests that Paul's missionary strategy consisted of two major elements 'which we may describe as "going" and "waiting"' The going bit we're very happy about - that's the Great Commission in action (though there's a good case to be made for saying that the commission is to make disciples, the going bit is taken read since we 'go' into the world every time we leave our homes - but that's a different story). Waiting sounds tricky. After all, if you've made the effort to go, shouldn't you set about speaking immediately?
Drane's point is that this is precisely what Paul didn't do. He went and waited, watched and listened. 'As well as going, his was also a strategy of waiting,' he says, ' creating space in which people could be themselves, and as themselves could decide without coercion how and when to respond to the challenge of the gospel.'
I guess what I'm suggesting is that we create waiting spaces, situations where we can meet and listen to our neighbours whether that's in our homes at parties, in the pub after work, over lunch, wherever. The point is that our neighbours feel able to be natural and we are meeting them because we want to know them. Where the relationship goes from there is genuinely open.
Drane argues that Paul followed the strategy of Jesus - both in his actions - partying and eating with whoever and allowing them to set the agenda by asking questions and making observations - and in his teaching - for instance in the parable of the 'waiting' father in Luke 15.
Of course, our desire is that people will hear and respond to the gospel. But if we wait before we speak, maybe they'll hear it in language they understand, from people they've come to know and like. At least then they might give our story a fair hearing.
He rightly points out that where he lives - in the North of England - parties are a bit middle class. People are more likely to congregate at the pub or Starbucks (surprisingly not seen as middle class - his phrase).
I guess this points out an obvious but essential thing: mission strategies need to fit the locality they're being tried in. If people don't go to parties, don't throw them. Find something people will come to. The point remains that we're doing this because we want to meet and hear them talking.
John Drane in an excellent article called 'Patterns of Evangelization in Paul and Jesus' (in Joel B Green and Max Turner [eds] Jesus of Nazareth: Lord and Christ, Eerdmanns 1994) suggests that Paul's missionary strategy consisted of two major elements 'which we may describe as "going" and "waiting"' The going bit we're very happy about - that's the Great Commission in action (though there's a good case to be made for saying that the commission is to make disciples, the going bit is taken read since we 'go' into the world every time we leave our homes - but that's a different story). Waiting sounds tricky. After all, if you've made the effort to go, shouldn't you set about speaking immediately?
Drane's point is that this is precisely what Paul didn't do. He went and waited, watched and listened. 'As well as going, his was also a strategy of waiting,' he says, ' creating space in which people could be themselves, and as themselves could decide without coercion how and when to respond to the challenge of the gospel.'
I guess what I'm suggesting is that we create waiting spaces, situations where we can meet and listen to our neighbours whether that's in our homes at parties, in the pub after work, over lunch, wherever. The point is that our neighbours feel able to be natural and we are meeting them because we want to know them. Where the relationship goes from there is genuinely open.
Drane argues that Paul followed the strategy of Jesus - both in his actions - partying and eating with whoever and allowing them to set the agenda by asking questions and making observations - and in his teaching - for instance in the parable of the 'waiting' father in Luke 15.
Of course, our desire is that people will hear and respond to the gospel. But if we wait before we speak, maybe they'll hear it in language they understand, from people they've come to know and like. At least then they might give our story a fair hearing.
Friday, September 30, 2005
Love your neighbour
Phin has spotted the major weakness of my new mission strategy - to have more parties - which is that we don't know our neighbours. We live fragmented lives; for many of us our homes are dorms we return to at night to sleep in, our lives are lived where we work. Increasingly, we even play on our own - solitary hours on gym machines fighting the signs of aging.
This is a parody, I appreciate - though I'm guessing it's not far from the truth for many of us and those who live on our streets.
I guess where I live, life is slightly more settled. People tend their gardens, wash their cars, walk their dogs. It's possible to see the same person regularly and hence actually meet them. My next door neighbour is good at parties - any excuse and she's cracking open bottles and inviting people to celebrate - and she gives me a clue to how it could be done.
Pick a date - say Halloween or bonfire night (in the UK) or kids starting school/university or changing jobs - run off a number of invites for your immediate neighbours (15 houses/flats in your street/block), say that you're having a party to celebrate whatever it is, everyone's welcome, bring a bottle. Obviously, we'd need to invest in some drink and nibbles - possibly even a BBQ and fireworks for bonfire night. Post the invites through people's doors and see what happens...
In some neighbourhoods it will at least start a conversation - neighbours might call round asking if we're serious, what they should bring, can they bring their children or a friend.
I think for it to work, we've got to be totally flexible - whatever our neighbours want to do, we ought to let them do (providing it's legal and doesn't endanger the lives of everyone there!). What we might find is that people really are looking for connection with other people, they really are isolated and would like to know their neighbours. If we achieve nothing else, we'll have created some social capital - and that's a result.
Sometimes I think Christians want to be religious all the time when what we need are people who'll model being human beings in a world that's lost the template. After all, Jesus came to renew us in our humanity, to restore what sin has left defaced and mangled. He was always at parties as far as I can tell, a nightmare for religious people, but a model of what it means to be a human being in the image of God to everyone else.
If anyone's tried this, let me know how it went. When I do it, I'll post the outcome...
This is a parody, I appreciate - though I'm guessing it's not far from the truth for many of us and those who live on our streets.
I guess where I live, life is slightly more settled. People tend their gardens, wash their cars, walk their dogs. It's possible to see the same person regularly and hence actually meet them. My next door neighbour is good at parties - any excuse and she's cracking open bottles and inviting people to celebrate - and she gives me a clue to how it could be done.
Pick a date - say Halloween or bonfire night (in the UK) or kids starting school/university or changing jobs - run off a number of invites for your immediate neighbours (15 houses/flats in your street/block), say that you're having a party to celebrate whatever it is, everyone's welcome, bring a bottle. Obviously, we'd need to invest in some drink and nibbles - possibly even a BBQ and fireworks for bonfire night. Post the invites through people's doors and see what happens...
In some neighbourhoods it will at least start a conversation - neighbours might call round asking if we're serious, what they should bring, can they bring their children or a friend.
I think for it to work, we've got to be totally flexible - whatever our neighbours want to do, we ought to let them do (providing it's legal and doesn't endanger the lives of everyone there!). What we might find is that people really are looking for connection with other people, they really are isolated and would like to know their neighbours. If we achieve nothing else, we'll have created some social capital - and that's a result.
Sometimes I think Christians want to be religious all the time when what we need are people who'll model being human beings in a world that's lost the template. After all, Jesus came to renew us in our humanity, to restore what sin has left defaced and mangled. He was always at parties as far as I can tell, a nightmare for religious people, but a model of what it means to be a human being in the image of God to everyone else.
If anyone's tried this, let me know how it went. When I do it, I'll post the outcome...
Tuesday, September 27, 2005
Is church too hard?
Mark in his comment on my last post hits the nail on the head when he suggests that needing to restate our vision every three months is a product of our modern targets-obsessed culture.
Last night I outlined the strategy I think the church should be adopting to reach people in response to that dreaded question - 'where are we going?'
Part of my answer was so complicated that even I lost track of it! But the core answer was really simple - 'let's have more parties', I said. 'Let's invite our neighbours into our homes for a social event with no agenda beyond having conversations with the people who live around us.'
Let's do this a couple of times and then let's touch base with one another and ask 'what did we talk about? What did our neighbours want to talk about? What were their concerns and interests?'
Having done this, we might be in a position to think about how we share our faith with our neighbours in the light of their interests and concerns.
It's not rocket science. I've said it before. But I'm more and more convinced it's something we need to try.
I'm haunted by the fact that people under a certain age know very little about the church and the Christian faith and that people over a certain age know rather too much. Most of the people in our church are over a certain age and assume everyone knows as much about church as they do. More than that, they think everyone else is interested in the church and what it has to say.
What we need to learn is that not only do they not know anything about the church and the Christian faith, they are not interested in it either. All Bob mayo's research points in this direction. I think we'd have to conclude the same from David Voas' work.
But this isn't a bad thing. It just means we need to communicate with them in a different way to the way many of us have grown up with. Hence the need for parties where we listen and pour drinks, pass canapes or sausage rolls and hear our neighbours speaking...
Who knows, we might just hear the voice of God.
Last night I outlined the strategy I think the church should be adopting to reach people in response to that dreaded question - 'where are we going?'
Part of my answer was so complicated that even I lost track of it! But the core answer was really simple - 'let's have more parties', I said. 'Let's invite our neighbours into our homes for a social event with no agenda beyond having conversations with the people who live around us.'
Let's do this a couple of times and then let's touch base with one another and ask 'what did we talk about? What did our neighbours want to talk about? What were their concerns and interests?'
Having done this, we might be in a position to think about how we share our faith with our neighbours in the light of their interests and concerns.
It's not rocket science. I've said it before. But I'm more and more convinced it's something we need to try.
I'm haunted by the fact that people under a certain age know very little about the church and the Christian faith and that people over a certain age know rather too much. Most of the people in our church are over a certain age and assume everyone knows as much about church as they do. More than that, they think everyone else is interested in the church and what it has to say.
What we need to learn is that not only do they not know anything about the church and the Christian faith, they are not interested in it either. All Bob mayo's research points in this direction. I think we'd have to conclude the same from David Voas' work.
But this isn't a bad thing. It just means we need to communicate with them in a different way to the way many of us have grown up with. Hence the need for parties where we listen and pour drinks, pass canapes or sausage rolls and hear our neighbours speaking...
Who knows, we might just hear the voice of God.
Monday, September 26, 2005
Dreaded questions...
There are two questions I dread being asked as a minister. The first is 'what exactly do you do?' We'll not go there!
The second is 'where are we going as a church?' It comes in many variations. I remember being asked by a very serious young woman newcomer in my previous church 'what is your vision for the church and how can I get on board with it?' I wilt before such interrogation!
But I've been asked twice today 'where are we going?' so it's made me think.
As usual, it's also made me a little obtuse. You see, I'm not sure the church ought to be going anywhere. We're here doing our stuff Sunday by Sunday. More than that, we care for people, visit the sick, teach the young, provide a place for the generations to meet each other, offer spiritual direction and counsel and pray for one another and our neighbours.
Where should we be going, exactly?
But I know this is a question about strategic planning and I need to take it seriously. After all one of the reasons why people get involved in church is that they feel they can make a contribution, be useful and make a difference.
The trouble is that the church is not a business, its members are not my salesforce. So I can't say, our aim is that this year we'll contact 500 new households, convert 10% of them, recruit 50 more children to our Sunday School and baptise 30 new believers. Not that it wouldn't be great if that happened! And I know ministers who'd say 'we're praying for 50 newcomers this year.'
Well, we had over 100 newcomers in the past year. But before you get too excited, we are the same size as we were this time last last year, so we obviously leak. Or maybe that's just the natural cycle of suburban life - people come and people go.
But where are we going? I would like to see more families joining the church - people with children at home aged between 30 and 55. In my mind I have the committed, well-adjusted, hospitable and gifted couples who take family life in their stride and have time to spare for church activities.
But who am I kidding? What I want to do is reach the 30-55s who aren't currently aware of their need for a relationship with God, who are struggling like the rest of us keeping too many balls to count airborne and who have no desire to help me build a church.
The thing is that as soon as I start to think about where we're going a mass of contradictory goals come into view. I want more people who would love to serve God in caring for people, hosting groups, sharing the load in Sunday school and other areas of the church's ministry. At the same time, I want to build a place where burned out Christians can find refuge from the demands of an ecclesiastical machine that has a habit of sucking Christians in and spitting them out all dry, wizened and used up. And then I want to build a community where those who have no interest in God at the moment are made to feel intrigued about what he might have to offer them because of what they see in the lives of Christians around them.
So, where are we going? I guess this has always been the dilemma for churches. It's the old tension between maintenance and mission, between caring for the flock and searching for the lost sheep.
I'd like to think that as a result of what we do, more people will know Jesus this time next year than currently do at the moment. How will that happen? Ah... That is what the question 'where are we going?' is actually asking. Sadly, I don't know the answer to that one...
The second is 'where are we going as a church?' It comes in many variations. I remember being asked by a very serious young woman newcomer in my previous church 'what is your vision for the church and how can I get on board with it?' I wilt before such interrogation!
But I've been asked twice today 'where are we going?' so it's made me think.
As usual, it's also made me a little obtuse. You see, I'm not sure the church ought to be going anywhere. We're here doing our stuff Sunday by Sunday. More than that, we care for people, visit the sick, teach the young, provide a place for the generations to meet each other, offer spiritual direction and counsel and pray for one another and our neighbours.
Where should we be going, exactly?
But I know this is a question about strategic planning and I need to take it seriously. After all one of the reasons why people get involved in church is that they feel they can make a contribution, be useful and make a difference.
The trouble is that the church is not a business, its members are not my salesforce. So I can't say, our aim is that this year we'll contact 500 new households, convert 10% of them, recruit 50 more children to our Sunday School and baptise 30 new believers. Not that it wouldn't be great if that happened! And I know ministers who'd say 'we're praying for 50 newcomers this year.'
Well, we had over 100 newcomers in the past year. But before you get too excited, we are the same size as we were this time last last year, so we obviously leak. Or maybe that's just the natural cycle of suburban life - people come and people go.
But where are we going? I would like to see more families joining the church - people with children at home aged between 30 and 55. In my mind I have the committed, well-adjusted, hospitable and gifted couples who take family life in their stride and have time to spare for church activities.
But who am I kidding? What I want to do is reach the 30-55s who aren't currently aware of their need for a relationship with God, who are struggling like the rest of us keeping too many balls to count airborne and who have no desire to help me build a church.
The thing is that as soon as I start to think about where we're going a mass of contradictory goals come into view. I want more people who would love to serve God in caring for people, hosting groups, sharing the load in Sunday school and other areas of the church's ministry. At the same time, I want to build a place where burned out Christians can find refuge from the demands of an ecclesiastical machine that has a habit of sucking Christians in and spitting them out all dry, wizened and used up. And then I want to build a community where those who have no interest in God at the moment are made to feel intrigued about what he might have to offer them because of what they see in the lives of Christians around them.
So, where are we going? I guess this has always been the dilemma for churches. It's the old tension between maintenance and mission, between caring for the flock and searching for the lost sheep.
I'd like to think that as a result of what we do, more people will know Jesus this time next year than currently do at the moment. How will that happen? Ah... That is what the question 'where are we going?' is actually asking. Sadly, I don't know the answer to that one...
Sunday, September 25, 2005
Are we really family?
These days we tend to see the New Testament's use of family language to describe fellow Christians - especially brother and sister - as conventional. Indeed gone are the days that Christians in the UK routinely refer to each other as brother or sister.
But for the early Christians this was anything but routine. One of the revolutionary aspects of their new faith was that through Jesus people who were not related became kin. That Paul thought this was worth stressing is seen in the fact that in 1 Corinthians, a letter written to fractious and divided community, he uses sibling language 39 times to stress the closeness of the bond that exists between Christians. He especially uses it when he wants to draw attention to behaviour that is inappropriate to our new family status - such as in 8:8-13 where he uses the word brother four times.
At the end of Romans in a list of greetings to various people involved in various house church groups across the city, he also uses the language of family - Phoebe is 'my sister', Rufus' mum has 'been a mother to me also', many in the list are described as 'beloved' - hardly the language we use of work colleagues.
And he uses it to stress the need to welcome one another (15:7). The situation is probably this: many of those named - especially the Jewish ones - are Jewish Christians who have recently returned to Rome having left in the late 40s when the Jewish community or parts of it were expelled from the city by Claudius. It's possible that those expelled were mainly Jewish Christians because historians of the day tell us that the expulsion happened following disturbances instigated by 'Chrestus' (possibly an early Latin miscontrual of Christ).
Now they were returning and needed to welcomed back into the predominantly Gentile house churches that were thriving in the city. Paul says these people - of different race, background and dietary behaviour - are brothers and sisters, family, kin and so should be welcomed with open arms and offered hospitality. It is possible that Romans 12-15 has been written with this in mind to ensure the family life of the churches in Rome is built up and the newcomers welcomed and included in the various groups that met around Rome.
For us it reminds us that we are family. If we are followers of Jesus, we are blood relatives of all the others followers of Jesus - whether we get on with them or not. We need to welcome one another, be hospitable, seek to help where we can and not discriminate against those who are new or different from us.
God gloriously calls us to be one family in his son Jesus - as Paul reminds us in his great Bible study in Galatians 3 which culminates in the ringing declaration of 3:28.
It also has something to say about church and post-church groups which I'll reflect on in a sbsequent post.
But for the early Christians this was anything but routine. One of the revolutionary aspects of their new faith was that through Jesus people who were not related became kin. That Paul thought this was worth stressing is seen in the fact that in 1 Corinthians, a letter written to fractious and divided community, he uses sibling language 39 times to stress the closeness of the bond that exists between Christians. He especially uses it when he wants to draw attention to behaviour that is inappropriate to our new family status - such as in 8:8-13 where he uses the word brother four times.
At the end of Romans in a list of greetings to various people involved in various house church groups across the city, he also uses the language of family - Phoebe is 'my sister', Rufus' mum has 'been a mother to me also', many in the list are described as 'beloved' - hardly the language we use of work colleagues.
And he uses it to stress the need to welcome one another (15:7). The situation is probably this: many of those named - especially the Jewish ones - are Jewish Christians who have recently returned to Rome having left in the late 40s when the Jewish community or parts of it were expelled from the city by Claudius. It's possible that those expelled were mainly Jewish Christians because historians of the day tell us that the expulsion happened following disturbances instigated by 'Chrestus' (possibly an early Latin miscontrual of Christ).
Now they were returning and needed to welcomed back into the predominantly Gentile house churches that were thriving in the city. Paul says these people - of different race, background and dietary behaviour - are brothers and sisters, family, kin and so should be welcomed with open arms and offered hospitality. It is possible that Romans 12-15 has been written with this in mind to ensure the family life of the churches in Rome is built up and the newcomers welcomed and included in the various groups that met around Rome.
For us it reminds us that we are family. If we are followers of Jesus, we are blood relatives of all the others followers of Jesus - whether we get on with them or not. We need to welcome one another, be hospitable, seek to help where we can and not discriminate against those who are new or different from us.
God gloriously calls us to be one family in his son Jesus - as Paul reminds us in his great Bible study in Galatians 3 which culminates in the ringing declaration of 3:28.
It also has something to say about church and post-church groups which I'll reflect on in a sbsequent post.
Monday, September 19, 2005
Latte, liturgy and living together
People leave church for all kinds of reasons. But one of the key ones - according to the published research and conversations I've had - is the behaviour of other Christians. People want to know Jesus but a few years of carping, criticism and condemnation by members of the church can be very waring and cause people to leave.
The sad thing is that many of these people are reticent to try another church because they assume the same thing will happen again.
Worse, the experience can corrode their faith. After all, if this is the way Christians behave, maybe that says something about the faith; maybe it means that it doesn't work, that it's not really true.
Jesus talked about those who cause little ones to stumble - something about mill-stones and lakes, I seem to remember. Paul wished that those troubling the Galatians would emasculate themselves (Galatians 5:12). Such talk makes you wince and wish for caveats until you've talked to some of the people whose faith has been shipwrecked by older brothers and sisters.
This is why Paul goes on to urge his Galatian readers to love each other or they risk biting, devouring and destroying one another.
Often our judgmental attitudes mask insecurities that we are afraid to admit or are born of wounds inflicted on us by others during our Christian lives. We perpetuate a cycle of harmed and harming.
So, here's an idea: if there's someone in your church that you don't get on with, who seems more likely to tear you down than build you up, invite them to join you for a latte (or whatever trendy beverage takes their fancy) and a chat about life (especially the things you have in common). It's much harder to knock chunks out of someone you know, whose vulnerabilities you've seen, who've passions and struggles you've shared.
Of course, it might make no difference but it's only set you back the back the price of a beverage.
This is a liturgical act - Romans 12:17-21 in action - and as such might bring God's light and love into situations and relationships which badly need both.
It's just a thought
The sad thing is that many of these people are reticent to try another church because they assume the same thing will happen again.
Worse, the experience can corrode their faith. After all, if this is the way Christians behave, maybe that says something about the faith; maybe it means that it doesn't work, that it's not really true.
Jesus talked about those who cause little ones to stumble - something about mill-stones and lakes, I seem to remember. Paul wished that those troubling the Galatians would emasculate themselves (Galatians 5:12). Such talk makes you wince and wish for caveats until you've talked to some of the people whose faith has been shipwrecked by older brothers and sisters.
This is why Paul goes on to urge his Galatian readers to love each other or they risk biting, devouring and destroying one another.
Often our judgmental attitudes mask insecurities that we are afraid to admit or are born of wounds inflicted on us by others during our Christian lives. We perpetuate a cycle of harmed and harming.
So, here's an idea: if there's someone in your church that you don't get on with, who seems more likely to tear you down than build you up, invite them to join you for a latte (or whatever trendy beverage takes their fancy) and a chat about life (especially the things you have in common). It's much harder to knock chunks out of someone you know, whose vulnerabilities you've seen, who've passions and struggles you've shared.
Of course, it might make no difference but it's only set you back the back the price of a beverage.
This is a liturgical act - Romans 12:17-21 in action - and as such might bring God's light and love into situations and relationships which badly need both.
It's just a thought
Thursday, September 15, 2005
Leaders of the free world
As the leaders of the free world - and those parts of the world under their heel - gather in New York, Elbow come storming over the horizon with their third album appropriately called Leaders of the free world.
For the uninitiated Elbow are the cream of the current crop of bands from England's North west. In writer Guy Garvey, they boast a songsmith of rare talent and sensibility.
In many ways this album picks up where A Cast of Thousands left off. Yet in so many ways it is an enormous leap forward both lyrically and musically. The lush textures and spare arrangements create a backdrop to musings that pack a real emotional punch.
For the uninitiated Elbow are the cream of the current crop of bands from England's North west. In writer Guy Garvey, they boast a songsmith of rare talent and sensibility.
In many ways this album picks up where A Cast of Thousands left off. Yet in so many ways it is an enormous leap forward both lyrically and musically. The lush textures and spare arrangements create a backdrop to musings that pack a real emotional punch.
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Life beyond church
Thanks to those who commented on my last post. What particularly got folk was this notion of not being likely to continue believing once you've stopped belonging - which was something David Voas suggested in his paper.
In a subsequent email, he did suggest that he was referring specifically to Christian teaching that says attending church is vital. Clearly if you stop attending, you stop subscribing to that part of the package. He agrees with Richter and Francis that stopping church attendance is not the same as losing faith.
But he adds two important observations. One is that Robin Gill at Kent uni has produced evidence showing that people who don't attend church tend to lose their Christian beliefs over time. The other is that Steve Bruce - an advocate of a thorough-going version of the secularisation thesis - argues that people say they still believe but that those beliefs have clearly become less important to them otherwise they wouldn't have stopped attending.
However, I'm still inclined to think that there are a lot of people who've stopped going to church because it's dull, doesn't help them with their daily lives, takes up vast amounts of time and energy on trivialities or teaches too narrow a version of the Christian faith (all the reasons Jamieson puts his finger on) but who have not stopped believing in the core doctrines of the faith. Indeed they want to carry on believing.
So, we come down to a debate over what constitutes church. For the sociologists, the answer is the institution identifiable on every street corner of the land with structured services at set times and a membership regime that means you're either in or out. And this is fair enough. But it's not what the New testament means by church.
So, many who have stopped attending the institution might well be part of informal Christian gatherings - whether these are loosely constituted post-church groups or meals with believing friends that involve chat about Christian things and might even end with a prayer. These gatherings don't show up on the sociologists' radar for obvious reasons. But they clearly happen all over the place and often help to reinforce the faith of those who've stopped attending institutional church.
Such groups are networked in New Zealand and I gather Alan Jamieson is publishing a follow up to A Churchless Faith soon that argues that such groups are essential to those who've left church but who five years on are still maintaining a Christian faith.
Keep the conversation going...
In a subsequent email, he did suggest that he was referring specifically to Christian teaching that says attending church is vital. Clearly if you stop attending, you stop subscribing to that part of the package. He agrees with Richter and Francis that stopping church attendance is not the same as losing faith.
But he adds two important observations. One is that Robin Gill at Kent uni has produced evidence showing that people who don't attend church tend to lose their Christian beliefs over time. The other is that Steve Bruce - an advocate of a thorough-going version of the secularisation thesis - argues that people say they still believe but that those beliefs have clearly become less important to them otherwise they wouldn't have stopped attending.
However, I'm still inclined to think that there are a lot of people who've stopped going to church because it's dull, doesn't help them with their daily lives, takes up vast amounts of time and energy on trivialities or teaches too narrow a version of the Christian faith (all the reasons Jamieson puts his finger on) but who have not stopped believing in the core doctrines of the faith. Indeed they want to carry on believing.
So, we come down to a debate over what constitutes church. For the sociologists, the answer is the institution identifiable on every street corner of the land with structured services at set times and a membership regime that means you're either in or out. And this is fair enough. But it's not what the New testament means by church.
So, many who have stopped attending the institution might well be part of informal Christian gatherings - whether these are loosely constituted post-church groups or meals with believing friends that involve chat about Christian things and might even end with a prayer. These gatherings don't show up on the sociologists' radar for obvious reasons. But they clearly happen all over the place and often help to reinforce the faith of those who've stopped attending institutional church.
Such groups are networked in New Zealand and I gather Alan Jamieson is publishing a follow up to A Churchless Faith soon that argues that such groups are essential to those who've left church but who five years on are still maintaining a Christian faith.
Keep the conversation going...
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
Sociologists and faith
I've been reading some very interesting work by a sociologist called David Voas. He and a colleague, Alasdair Crockett, have been looking at data from the British Household Panel Survey and British Social Attitudes Survey searching for insight into Christian belief and church belonging in contemporary Britain.
For many years lots of us have been attracted to Grace Davie's suggestion that while church attendance is falling, Christian belief is still important in British society. More people believe than belong and Davie's 1994 book Religion in Britain Since 1945 was subtitled Believing without Belonging.
It is this notion that Voas and Crockett set out to challenge. And their article in the February 2005 issue of the Journal Sociology 'Religion in Britain: neither believing nor belonging' is pretty convincing. I have to add that as a working pastor, it's also pretty sobering and thought-provoking.
One of their key findings delivered using a telling image from the science of radioactivity is 'in Britain institutional religion now has a half-life of one generation.' This is based on data that indicates that children from families where two parents go to church are around 48% likely to become church-going adults themselves. Where only one parent attends church regularly (by which they mean once a month), the outcome is halved.
This gives our church's current thinking about and search for a youth worker a certain edge!
But another comment in the article also caught my eye. Talking about data that suggests levels of belief mirror those of belonging, Voas and Crockett say: 'If people choose not to belong it is a clear sign that they do not believe religious doctrine. Whether or not they are confident that God exists, it is apparent at the very least that they doubt the Almighty much minds whether they spend Sunday in church or in the shops.'
This assertion seems to contradict the findings of Richter and Leslie in Gone But not Forgotten and Alan Jamieson in A Churchless Faith. But I wonder whether it's an observation we need to take seriously. It's possible that what these guys are writing about is a transitional phenomenon. Some people leave church for relational and institutional reasons with their faith in core doctrines in tact but over time if they don't re-engage with a Christian group or church, those beliefs decay (to use the radioactive image).
It is, of course, possible that church leavers are being polite when they suggest that they still believe in Jesus, it's just Christians they can't stand. And, of course, mission thinkers have for a generation asserted that people find Jesus attractive but don't want the church. But Voas and Crockett might have unearthed something we don't want to accept: that there is a much closer correlation between belief and belonging and that when people choose not to belong, they are saying that they have ceased or are ceasing to believe - at least in the way they used to.
This has some implications for post-church groups. I'm going to a meeting on Friday about those, so I'll blog more on this over the weekend.
There is good news hidden in all this, however. Bob Mayo from Ridley Hall, Cambridge, has researched the beliefs of generation Y and found they don't have any - at least, they don't have beliefs or views about the Christian faith. This is good news. They are not disillusioned spiritual searchers who've tried Christianity, found it wanting and are looking elsewhere. They are people who don't know the story, are not hostile to it and if told it in language they understand, will give it a fair hearing.
That too has implications for our search for a youth worker...
For many years lots of us have been attracted to Grace Davie's suggestion that while church attendance is falling, Christian belief is still important in British society. More people believe than belong and Davie's 1994 book Religion in Britain Since 1945 was subtitled Believing without Belonging.
It is this notion that Voas and Crockett set out to challenge. And their article in the February 2005 issue of the Journal Sociology 'Religion in Britain: neither believing nor belonging' is pretty convincing. I have to add that as a working pastor, it's also pretty sobering and thought-provoking.
One of their key findings delivered using a telling image from the science of radioactivity is 'in Britain institutional religion now has a half-life of one generation.' This is based on data that indicates that children from families where two parents go to church are around 48% likely to become church-going adults themselves. Where only one parent attends church regularly (by which they mean once a month), the outcome is halved.
This gives our church's current thinking about and search for a youth worker a certain edge!
But another comment in the article also caught my eye. Talking about data that suggests levels of belief mirror those of belonging, Voas and Crockett say: 'If people choose not to belong it is a clear sign that they do not believe religious doctrine. Whether or not they are confident that God exists, it is apparent at the very least that they doubt the Almighty much minds whether they spend Sunday in church or in the shops.'
This assertion seems to contradict the findings of Richter and Leslie in Gone But not Forgotten and Alan Jamieson in A Churchless Faith. But I wonder whether it's an observation we need to take seriously. It's possible that what these guys are writing about is a transitional phenomenon. Some people leave church for relational and institutional reasons with their faith in core doctrines in tact but over time if they don't re-engage with a Christian group or church, those beliefs decay (to use the radioactive image).
It is, of course, possible that church leavers are being polite when they suggest that they still believe in Jesus, it's just Christians they can't stand. And, of course, mission thinkers have for a generation asserted that people find Jesus attractive but don't want the church. But Voas and Crockett might have unearthed something we don't want to accept: that there is a much closer correlation between belief and belonging and that when people choose not to belong, they are saying that they have ceased or are ceasing to believe - at least in the way they used to.
This has some implications for post-church groups. I'm going to a meeting on Friday about those, so I'll blog more on this over the weekend.
There is good news hidden in all this, however. Bob Mayo from Ridley Hall, Cambridge, has researched the beliefs of generation Y and found they don't have any - at least, they don't have beliefs or views about the Christian faith. This is good news. They are not disillusioned spiritual searchers who've tried Christianity, found it wanting and are looking elsewhere. They are people who don't know the story, are not hostile to it and if told it in language they understand, will give it a fair hearing.
That too has implications for our search for a youth worker...
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